Air Show

These past few months have been amazing for our family. Nathan has had most weekends off and his schedule has been very light. We've been able to make plans and count of them! But we're entering a new cycle of heavy workload for Nathan. I asked what he wanted to do for his last big weekend and he said he wanted to see the Blue Angels perform at the KC Airshow. The Airshow is all weekend, from 10-5 and it's at the downtown airport (a small airport for small, local planes, not the KC International Airport).

The tickets were $20 each and while it's expensive we knew it would be worth it. The problem was that the only way to get to the airport was to park downtown (about 10-15 minutes away from the venue) and then take a school bus to the airport. You also had to take everything in clear plastic bags, and couldn't bring any cameras bigger than a phone.

Nathan didn't have to work but he was "on-call" as a back-up, plus we have Allison, our little wild card. The airport was full-sun and we didn't want to trapped with 50, 000 + people with no way out of there. Instead we decided to head to the Riverfront Park which was right across the river from the event. We sat in the shade, ate our packed lunches, and in between flights (there was a 2 hour break before the Blue Angels took to the sky) we walked around the farmer's market, got ice cream, and relaxed.

It would have been interesting to see the planes up close but I'm so glad we didn't go into the airport. Nathan was buzzing waiting for the Blue Angels - telling me facts about all the different planes. Did you know the Blue Angels have a 10% fatality rate? The last Airshow, 4 years ago, had one fatality when a single plane crashed. And this weekend 8 people were killed during Airshows (in Europe).

There was supposed to be a synchronized parachute team but last weekend the team performed in Chicago and two men hit each other, one was knocked unconscious and then slammed into a building and died. As a tribute, the planes who carried the team members went through the routine (minus the jumpers) and at the end, the plane that carried the man who died, turned off his smoke, and pulled away from the group.

Here are a lot of pictures from the day - it was an amazing experience. Allison did really well, especially for not taking a nap! At the end of the day, we jumped in our car, and headed home. It took 25 minutes to be back at our house (and that's only because we stopped for milkshakes). I heard on the news later that night that lines to get back on the school buses took hours!